I’d be curious to know what specific components you’ve noticed a quality decline in-
I suspected that with change in ownership that quality of some products might decline- I’m most concerned with gears, and those have been made in TW for a long time by one supplier - it would suck for them if they changed anything that might negatively impact brand reputation-
Very limited options for quality options Toyota gears
the #1 thing i have experience with is the nitro 100 series uca's that appear to be the same as all of the other taiwan made uca's with a cheap taiwan ball joint. I paid $800 based on their made in Australia claim, the ones I got are even in the same box as another set of roadsafe uca's I have on the shelf that say made in taiwan. The nitros had no country of origin listed on the box, but justdifferentials said they are made in Australia. Roadsafe is an Australian company selling taiwan made uca's under a few different brands (blackhawk, nitro, roadsafe etc).
Carl was the one who kept manufacturing of their gears with the same supplier, I would not be surprised to see daystar (the new owners) change to a cheaper gear supplier without letting anyone know or adjusting their prices to reflect cheaper manufacture. The recently dropped the price of their uca's, but they essentially pulled a bait and switch on the overpriced uca's that I received 8 months ago. Their customer service is horrible and even if you can get someone on the phone, they will not do anything to fix issues.
On my last order they listed the item as in stock. After I ordered, I got an email immediately saying they were out of stock and asking if I would like a refund or to wait for backorder. I said refund, maui said I was refunded. after 8 weeks with no refund and the same email run around, I had to dispute the charge with my credit card company. Master card could not get ahold of them either, so they gave me a credit and went after justdifferrentials to get their money back, which took 3 months.
One of the 4 complete diffs I bought from them over the last few years was extremely rusty (large chunks flaking off of the iron case). I would have thrown the core they used in the trash.
The other issue I had was I paid a core charge for a 200 series diffs (stronger case) and received 2 thirds with 200 series gears in an 80 series diff. I paid $200 extra in core charges (the 97 and older 9.5" diffs are $150 core, 98+ are $250) for the stronger case and received one rusted out 80 series diff and another clean 80 series diff. Again, you cant get anyone on the phone and their customer service says they are taking care of it but do nothing.
I highly recommend zuk for gears, he has build a lot of toyota diffs for me over the past 15 years and I have never had any issues. Zuk checks all gears before installing and will not install gears that have quality issues, so no matter what brand you go with you know they will last.
